Chapter 5
The Genius (Second Take)
Below lies the fifth chapter of the full-length novel, The Girl with the Strawberry Eyes. If you’ve not read the first five parts, I strongly suggest you go back and do so. You’ve the option of choosing either an EPUB file or a PDF, or reading the work in the space below. New chapters will be added every Wednesday. Cheers and Happy Reading.
The Genius (Second Take)
To call Paginelle’s room a “room” would have been an insult to rooms everywhere. It was not a room; it was a closet into which her bed fit. And even then, just barely. Fortunately, the walls of this glorified closet were quite tall, so Paginelle had been able to install several shelves on which she stored her books. Additionally, she had twisted a number of hooks into that tall, dark wood, and it was from these that she hung her clothes.
Indeed, the room was the only thing she had ever known, and, as such, it suited her. However, she wasn’t as naïve as one might expect. She knew that her living situation wasn’t exactly what anybody would consider ideal. That being the case, she had no desire whatsoever to show Frost where she spent the majority of her days. She brought the other girl to the room’s doorway and then stopped cold.
“I say,” Frost said, bobbing her head every which way in order to see past Paginelle into the room. “Is something the matter?”
Paginelle cleared her throat and made an effort to project a voice that rang with clarity and confidence: “There’s no point going in here,” she said. “There’s nothing to see.”
“Nonsense!”
Paginelle’s confidence deflated a bit. “Nothing, um … nothing interesting, anyway.”
Frost clamped a hand on her hip and cocked her head to the side. Her expression was one of both sympathy and slight exasperation. “Nelle, listen. I realize that Vauxhall’s girls have a reputation for being … out of touch, let’s say. And … well, in many cases, that reputation is deserved. It even applied to me at one time. But so you know, I’ve changed—”
“Because you went for a joyride in a Cloudskipper,” Paginelle finished. “Yes, I know. That still doesn’t mean you need to come into my room. You can actually sneak back to your car and drive home if you want. All that stuff my father said about relaxing and chit-chatting and being a good host? He was talking out of his ass. He doesn’t believe any of it.”
“Be that as it may,” Frost said evenly, “I’m not here to judge; I’m really not. I’m sure, at times, you probably think of me as little more than a loquacious cartoon, and that’s perfectly understandable.”
“I never said that!” said Paginelle.
“Oh, Nelle, you don’t have to have said it for it to be true.”
“But—”
“And you needn’t worry about my hurt feelings either. We’re required to complete a freshman seminar on self-awareness at Veronica Vauxhall’s.”
“Uh … huh.”
“The point, Nelle, is that whilst you might be inclined to think of me as ridiculous, know that I am also capable of sincerity. I was, for example, nothing but sincere when I said that I wanted to become your friend; when I said that I wanted to learn about all of your many facets—”
“Of course you do,” Paginelle sighed.
“And that includes your room.”
“Of course it does,” Paginelle said with another sigh.
“So … perhaps step aside?” said Frost, fluttering her eyelashes innocently. “I’d hate to have to barrel through you like a dump truck, but you know I will.”
“Fine, you can come in. But just, um … I need to take care of some things first.”
“You mean like that enormous snow spider over there?”
Paginelle craned her neck. “Enormous—?”
“Ha!”
Before Paginelle could stop her, Frost had dashed under her arm and into the room.
“Ah,” Frost said, stretching her neck backwards in order to gaze up at the tall, tall walls. “Ah ha.”
Paginelle expected her to drop some unintentionally condescending comment about how “cozy” the place was, but all she said was, “My, you’ve a lot of books.” And then, her overbite stretched wide, she met eyes with Paginelle and said, “You remind me an awfully lot of my father, you know. He has an enormous amount of books. They’re just not arranged so … vertically.” She stretched back her neck and resumed gazing. “Wow.”
“My father has an enormous amount of books, too,” Paginelle muttered under her breath. “See all the good it’s done him.”
“What do you mean by that?” said Frost.
“Do I really have to spell it out?” Paginelle grumbled. “I thought you were the one Vauxhall’s girl who wasn’t out of touch.”
Frost glanced at Paginelle again, something of a pleading look in her eyes. “Let’s not be unpleasant with each other, okay? There’s already so much of that in the world. Is it okay if I sit on your bed? It’s so beautifully made that I don’t want to—”
“It’s fine,” said Paginelle. “Go ahead. Sit.”
“And you’ll sit with me?”
“Um….”
“Oh, come on,” Frost said, taking both of Paginelle’s hands and pulling her onto the bed next to her. “It’s no fun if you’re standing over there by yourself.”
“I don’t know about that one,” said Paginelle. “I think better when I stand.”
“Really?”
“Probably not, but if I sit for too long, I fall asleep. Especially when I’m sitting on this bed.”
“It is a bed, Nelle.”
“I think it’s cursed. Cursed to make me unproductive.”
“It is a bed, Nelle.”
“A desk would be nice,” said Paginelle wistfully, “but where would I put it? On the ceiling?”
“You don’t have to worry about falling asleep,” said Frost. “If you start to nod off, I’ll pinch you under the armpit. That’s the best place to pinch somebody who’s in danger of falling asleep.”
Paginelle pursed her lips. “Is that something else you learned at Veronica Vauxhall’s?”
“No, my mother taught me that one.” Frost shrugged. “She’s Russian.”
“Do … Russians often pinch each other in the armpit?”
“Oh, it has nothing to do with Russian culture at large. The ghost of Gogol told my mother this tip when she was a girl visiting the Hermitage Museum.”
Paginelle frowned. “Gogol the writer?”
Frost touched a finger to her chin. “It was either him or Pushkin.”
“You do know they looked nothing alike, right?”
“Perhaps it was both of them?”
“They were two of the greatest writers of their respective generations,” said Paginelle, “and now they whisper obscure life tips to little girls.”
“Because the world has a sense of humor, I suppose.”
“It really must,” said Paginelle. “I mean, look at my father. He used to be a lecturer at both Harvard and Saint Pollux’s—”
“Saint Pollux’s!”
“—and now he’s here. I’m sure somebody somewhere finds that hilarious.”
“I … know we agreed not to talk about unpleasant things,” said Frost quietly, “but I have to wonder … is it really so bad living here? I hope I don’t come off as sounding too ignorant. I’m genuinely curious. Because … because, yes, this is a small house, but small doesn’t necessarily mean bad, does it?”
“Well—”
“Oh, gosh,” Frost said, deflating a little, “I sound dreadfully out of touch, don’t I.”
“Don’t stress yourself,” said Paginelle. “And to answer your question, the only really bad thing about living here … well, I guess there are many bad things, but the worst thing is the atmosphere.”
“The atmosphere?” Frost said, blinking perplexedly. “But the valley just seems so charming. And then there’s all of that green—”
“That’s not what I meant,” said Paginelle. “I’m talking about the people here.”
Frost’s smile shrank a bit. “The people?”
“Yes, the people who live in those other little green houses. They”—Paginelle let out a long breath—“they’re all like my father.”
“All like your father?” said Frost. “I’m a little afraid to ask, but how so?”
Paginelle let out another long breath. “Well, they … they all had dreams of becoming great Scholars or Memory Seers, but they all failed. Either they’re not intelligent enough, or creative enough, or—or disciplined enough to succeed, but they’re too stubborn to give up. Almost all of them have families but none of them wants to get a real job to actually support those families. They want to spend all day with their stupid projects.”
“That’s so tragic to hear,” said Frost. “But.”
“But?”
“But … before I can fully express my sympathy, there is something I need to ask.”
Paginelle tried not to squirm too much. “Okay.”
“You told me,” said Frost, “that the people who live in this valley aspire to become either great Scholars or great Memory Seers. What, exactly…? That is to say, I’d heard the term once before, and that was when crumbly, curmudgeonly Professor Willum at Veronica Vauxhall’s told us that a Memory Seer was something we Vauxhallians should never hope to become. He said that the Seerish way of life is a complete waste of intellect and talent, and is only suitable for agoraphobic misanthropes who will never produce anything of societal value. Also, he said that Memory Seers sneer at the idea of bathing. I … obviously don’t want that to be my post-Vauxhall’s life, so I’ve never had much of an incentive to find out more about it. But it seems I’ve really no choice at present, lest I risk … not knowing what it is you’re talking about. Of course, if this is, for whatever reason, too personal of a topic for discussion, then I one thousand percent completely understand—”
“I-it’s not a problem,” Paginelle. “Memory Seers….”
Show it to her.
Paginelle’s cheeks warmed. It wouldn’t have been the hardest thing to do, would it? Just to show her? After all, she only had to reach under her bed.
“I say,” Frost said, the corners of her eyes creasing with concern, “is something the matter?”
Show it to her.
“S-something the matter?” Paginelle sputtered. “Um. No. N-nothing.”
Show it to her. Isn’t that what you want? For somebody to tell you how brilliant you are?
Frost pulled back a little. “I don’t believe you. You’re hiding something.”
“I’m really not. I just, um—”
Show her!
“Sorry, what was your question again?”
“Memory Seers,” said Frost. She sounded more puzzled than impatient. “Memory Seers. You … were about to tell me what they are.”
“Oh, um, right.” Paginelle forced herself to forget what was under the bed by focusing on Frost’s eyes. She’d never noticed the flecks of green in all of that gray….
Frost pulled back a little more. “You’re giving me strange looks.”
“N-not intentionally.”
“How can it not be intentional?” said Frost. “Is somebody forcing you to stare at me?”
Paginelle closed her eyes and tried to focus her thinking. Again.
“Nelle?” Frost said scooting a little closer. “Have I said something to offend?”
“Wh-what? Oh, um, no. No, of course not. I was just….”
Frost scooted a bit closer. “Just what?”
Paginelle let out a ragged breath. “Christ, I don’t know why I’m making this so awkward. I was, um … yes, I was staring intentionally, but not to, like, freak you out.”
“Well, that’s a relief to hear,” Frost said with a little smile. “I can’t really blame you, though, as people often get lost in my eyes.”
Paginelle’s cheeks burned. “I didn’t get lost in your eyes!”
“It was a joke. Difficult as it may be to fathom, Vauxhall’s girls are capable of cracking jokes from time to time.”
But Paginelle didn’t seem to have heard: “I—I was just trying to think better.”
“You think better by staring at people?”
“In some cases … yeah, sure, why not?”
Frost’s smile dipped a little. “I see.”
“Mmm hmm. So … what were we talking about again?”
“Memory Seers,” said Frost. “Though I’m starting to wonder if perhaps we oughtn’t talk about something else.”
“No no, we can talk about Memory Seers if you want,” Paginelle said quickly. “I’m just being an idiot.”
“Very well,” Frost aid, pulling up her legs and tucking them underneath her skirt. Her smile returned in full. “Teach me.”
Paginelle took a few more moments to focus her thoughts, then said, “Memory Seers are scholar-inventors … who can use art and science to … well, to make magic, for lack of a better term.
Frost pursed her lips skeptically. “Magic?”
“Not actual magic,” Paginelle clarified. “But amazing things that might be misconstrued as magical. Or—or even miraculous. The successful ones, anyway.”
Frost narrowed her eyes. “I see. Magical, or miraculous. Misconstrued as. But only the successful ones.”
“And it’s super-hard to be a successful Memory Seer,” Paginelle added.
“Fascinating. However, I can’t help but wonder what attracts so many Scholars and Memory Seers to this valley in particular. It is very charming, but wouldn’t they much rather wile their days away at one of the Great Libraries? The Horliotecca, for instance? Or the Great Arch Library of Istanbul?
“It’s Lady Drusilla,” said Paginelle. The inside of her mouth always went a bit stale whenever she said that name.
Frost shifted about excitedly. “The landlady is the reason why all of these people come here? Truly? Is she a great beauty of something? Or perhaps she possess an incredible intellect?”
“It’s nothing like that,” Paginelle said shortly. “She has books.”
“Books?” Frost echoed.
“As much as any of the Great Libraries,” said Paginelle. “Supposedly. And some of them are so rare that they can’t be found anywhere else in the world. Most of the books in this house belong to Lady Drusilla. They … they stimulate my father’s imagination endlessly, but he never … he can never follow through and make anything that works. Because he isn’t talented enough. And—and I know that’s a really awful thing to say about my own father, but it’s true. How could it not be true? He’s been trying and failing for literally all of his adult life—before I was even born!” Paginelle realized that her breathing had become shaky. She tried to steady herself. “Maybe if we lived somewhere else, he might’ve already quit. Might have already quit. But since we live here, whenever he gets to a dead end on one idea, Lady Drusilla gives him some book that makes him go chasing after a totally new one. I … I hate her for continuously giving him bogus hopes, and—and I hate him for being so prideful and full of himself that he gets tricked every time. I—I—I—” She had started breathing heavily, and her cheeks were flush, and little pearls of sweat dotted her forehead. “I … I know I should probably be telling you more about Memory Seers and stuff, but God, all of that felt good to say. I didn’t realize I’d been holding all of it in.”
Frost leaned forward and rested her cheeks in her palms. “Is there anything else you’d like to get off your chest? The doctor, for all intents and purposes, is in.”
Paginelle opened her mouth to reply, but before she could utter a sound, a sharp shriek pierced the air outside. The sound was so horrifically loud that it sent shivers up and down the walls of her room and shook free a few books from their shelves.
“Crikers,” Frost said, her eyes wide. “What was that?”
Paginelle, who still felt some exhilaration from the recent expulsion of her feelings, said, “You mean you’ve never heard it before? But you don’t live that far away.”
The shriek ripped through the air a second time and fear started to seep into Frost’s eyes. “I’ve never heard that sound in my life. What—?”
“That,” said Paginelle, sliding off the bed, “is Lady Drusilla.”
“Luh … Lady Drusilla?” said Frost
“Yup,” Paginelle said with a little sigh. “She’s coming down from her castle. Which is good for you, I guess, because you wanted to meet her, right?”
“Now that I think about it,” said Frost, “no, not particularly. Especially if she makes sounds like that.”
“Well, you might not have a choice if she’s coming to see my father. Let’s go.”
And they went.
Many thanks for reading(!) And now, on to Chapter 6….
Or,
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